Paraguay keeping M3 Stuart and M4 Sherman tanks in service

IHS Jane’s is reporting that Paraguay is putting their fleet of M4 Sherman medium tanks and M3 Stuart light tanks back into service as training vehicles. Paraguay is believed to have three Sherman medium tanks and up to fifteen Stuart light tanks in its inventory. The M3 tanks were delivered to the Paraguayan Army in 1970 from neighboring Brazil while the M4 Sherman tanks were delivered in 1980 from Argentina.

Theses tanks were put into storage in 1996 after a threatened army coup. In 2014 it was decided to return 10 of the Stuart tanks to operational status. These ten vehicles consist of five M3 and five M3A1 tanks, with new engines and a M2 .50 cal machine gun mounted on the roof in place of the .30 cal machine gun. These vehicles are used by Regimiento de Caballería N°4 (RC4), which has een reorganized as the army’s armor school.

Less is known about the status of the three M4 Sherman tanks. They are reported to be part of Paraguay’s Presidential Escort Regiment. These three vehicles are “repotenciado” tanks modified by Argentina. They resemble the Firefly variant of the Sherman but with a diesel engine and the 105 mm FTR L44/57 gun (an Argentine licensed copy of the CN-105-57 Gun used on the AMX-13)